Lorbetske Family Tree

So....what's in a name??

Lukasz Rolbiecki was born in Poland around 1786 - he married Ewa and they had 5 children - all of which maintained their proper last name - Rolbiecki.

However, in 1859 whilst Anton (Lukasz' son) was travelling  to the USA - someone decided to throw the letters of his name in a dice cup and what came out was Lorbiecki.  Anton's brother Peter who followed 3 years later to the US - well he decided to keep his name Rolbiecki, as did his descendants.

So as early as 1862 we have both Rolbiecki's and Lorbiecki's living in the United States.

Anton's son also named Anton was born as a Rolbiecki but died as a Lorbiecki - all of his children were Lorbiecki's at birth.

But, the Lorbiecki's apparently had a penchant for change as by 1895 Land Record records indicate Anton now as Lorbecke, and when his son Frank married the name morphed to Lorbetski.

The name again changed to Lorbetske - and only Frank and Amelia's eldest, Carl maintained that name the remainder of his life.  His brother Anton also used the Lorbetski name but eventually changed it to Lorbetske.

Anton (Frank's father) had a brother August - some of his children changed their name to Lorbeck.

It may be interesting to note that these name changes didn't require going to the Courthouse or anything like that...all one had to do is just start using their new name.

First names weren't immune - apparently the eldest daughters of Frank and Amelia, namely Bertha and Clara 'changed' many of the names of their siblings....hence we have Aunt Clara who was born Terese - Lucille who's first name was actually Regina - Harry was actually Edward and Earlyne who was called Margaret -  she actually had it added to her name legally prior to getting married.

All of this makes for an 'interesting' challenge when trying to sort out who was who back 'in the day'.

The Rolbiecki's weren't an anomaly - there are Dahlmann's - Dahlman's - Dallmann's - Dallman's; Stefoneck's - Stepaniak's - Stefonick's and Stefonek's.

One short anecdote - Aunt Earlyne, Aunt Evelyn and Gwen Nehring travelled to Poland and while there they had a driver take them to the ancestral town of our ancestors.  The driver stopped to ask a pedestrian for information on the family name - as luck would have it they were excitedly transported to a home of relatives of ours.  Through tortured translating they were taken to the local cemetery where they were shown the grave marker of a "Rolbiecki"  - confusion set in - but the 'locals' were insistent they were in the right place - Aunt Earlyne for one was not happy !!!  She just couldn't believe that her last name was once something else....